Engineering Notes

By Tony Massau

Arrangements have been made to move the pony trucks from the outdoor site over to the loco yard and the erecting shop in the near future in preparation for installation under 82045. Arrangements can then be made to fit the pony trucks in place with the aid of the wheel drop.

Installation of grease lubrication pipework to the horn guides of the coupled wheels continues.

Machining of the boiler water level gauge frames continues.

Recent firebox work has included riveting in place the pads on the crown for the safety valves and manifold and shaping the doubling plates for the four mud holes on the firebox crown near the corners.

Some smartening up of paintwork on various parts of the loco which have suffered from the weather is in progress.

ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING

By Chris Proudfoot

Those of you who have received the Autumn Newsletter already will know that we have decided not to hold the AGM in October, as we had planned. The continuing uncertainties and constantly changing advice about coronavirus led us to conclude that it would be unwise, even irresponsible, to invite supporters to sit in close proximity to each other in a confined space, and we hope that you will understand this decision. The emailed Newsletter and attachments have gone out, and the postal copies should be received in the next few days.

I will try and arrange a date next April - the usual month for the Trust hold its AGM - and will let you know the outcome in next month's updates. Let's just hope that it will be possible to resume normal service by then. We are living through strange times, and I think just about everyone is confused and fed-up!

82XXX IN BR DAYS

As always, our readers have turned up trumps following on from last month's photograph of 42616 and 82032 at Willesden. Peter Winstanley deciphered the chalked message on the 82's bunker as 'FIRE OUT', and went on to say that 82032 had been en route from North Wales to (presumably) Nine Elms but got only as far as Willesden, where it was failed and withdrawn [probably for something quite trivial]. Patrick Hearn sent me details of the history of both locos at that sad time, and said that 42616 lasted until 1967, so perhaps it had been used to push 82032 up to the buffer stops. Thank you, gents, both!

The first of this month's images shows 82029 at Penrith some time in the 1950's. Nos 82026-9 were allocated to the NE for the first few years of their short lives, and 82029 in particular seems to have been a good engine: I have somewhere an account by Norman McKillop ('Toram Beg') of firing this engine over the Stainmore route. He was full of praise for its performance and ease of working compared with the indigenous NER A8 tanks that were also used over this route. It was one of the last two 82XXX in active service - by now on the SR - right up to July 1967, and has gone down in history for a Wagnerian last stand on the last day of Southern steam, when it was pressed into service to work the Salisbury parcels. What a pity this wasn't followed by preservation.

Thanks to Ivan Whitehouse for the shot. We don't know who took it, so if anyone can help us here, please get in touch so we can make the appropriate acknowledgement.

Neil Evans has sent me this nice shot of 82020 posed against the distinctive rock wall that backed (and still backs) Machynlleth depot, ca 1963. This engine seems to have been one of the most frequently photographed members of the class. It spent most of its life in the Cheshire/North Wales area before being transferred in 1965 to Nine Elms (see June updates), where it would see out its last couple of years. I've always thought that the 'economy' unlined green livery was the one that least suited these engines, but this is nevertheless an attractive image.

Again, we don't know the provenance of the photograph, so please get in touch if you do.